


Plumage

by Runwildwithme (NectarinesAndSourThings)



Series: Tales from the Else [3]
Category: Elsewhere University (Webcomic)
Genre: Autumn court, Fae & Fairies, Hospitality rites, Impossible Quest, Part twoooooooo!!!, Quests, The Else, The Spring Court, The Summer Court, Underhill - Freeform, and now they need to go about...you know..questing, faerie - Freeform, got a quest, they made it underhill, winter has yet to make an appearance. hmm.
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:27:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24194296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NectarinesAndSourThings/pseuds/Runwildwithme
Summary: You made it underhill, found your companions, and narrowly escaped being hunted down, dying of poison, or being eaten.You even found out who, exactly stole your Name, along with the Names of every other Elsewhere University student. Now all you need to do is do something about that, and preferably before the original Jenna sells all of you - and Elsewhere too - to the Summer Queen.You still don't know why the Crow Prince is willing to help you. (Not-Jenna has an idea.) You're going to find out.
Series: Tales from the Else [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/815868
Comments: 23
Kudos: 84





	Plumage

**Author's Note:**

> HELLLLOOOOOOOO my lovelies!!!!! I BRING YOU PART 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> As I said in the last chapter-cum-announcement of Feathers, I am SO, SO grateful to every damn one of you. This is a fairly short chapter, but you'll see some character background, some motivations, and some well-needed rest. 
> 
> I hope y'all are safe and healthy!!!
> 
> As always, please enjoy!!!

A long, long time ago, when the Hill was still new:

—

He’s not a crow, Crow sometimes thinks. Not like the others, anyway. 

But that is a ridiculous thought, a _pigeon_ thought, even. Of course he’s a crow. 

‘That is not a crow thing,’ Crow on the branch tells him, peering down. 

‘Of course it’s a crow thing.’ He says. ‘It is a thing, I am a crow, the thing is being done by a crow. It is a crow thing.’

Crow on the branch isn’t convinced, but that’s alright. Crow clacks his beak at him, and then again at the human sitting next to him. The human turns the page of the book for him and Crow ruffles his feathers amiably. 

‘Good human’ he tells it. It looks at him for a bit before turning back to its own book. Poor things aren’t terribly conversational, though they sure chatter an awful lot of nonsense amongst themselves. 

‘What is it, then, is this crow thing that you’re doing?’ Crow on the branch asks. Grumpy thing. 

‘Looking at a human thing.’ Crow tells him. That...maybe cuts against his argument. 

Crow on the branch _hmmm_ s dubiously at him. Crow just clacks his beak again. 

The human reaches over and turns another page. 

Crows sighs, but tells it ‘Good human’ again anyway. He’s seen how they train dogs- consistency is key. Crow on the branch laughs at him and flies away. 

—

“Have you guys noticed that the crows are getting weirder?”

“... you don’t think they’re gonna go the same way as the squir—”

“DON’T. We do _not_ talk about the squ—”

“STOP!”

—

The Crow Prince isn’t a crow- not _truly_ , not _really_ . He _is_ a crow, of course he is, but ... but he isn’t. He _used_ to be. 

He isn’t a faerie, either. Not really, not truly, except for, of course, all the ways he is. 

He was a crow until he became something more; until he did all sorts of crow things and all sorts of not crow things, and declared them one and the same because it was a crow who was doing them, until he had done so many different crow things, until he was the only crow to have done these crow things, until until _until_. 

(it is a sort of magic, you know, to do things that are not for you, to change them _into_ things for you, simply for having done them)

So Crow did many, many things, and in the doing became a little more magical with each new doing, until- well. Until. 

The Hill was there, by then. Or rather, the University was on the Hill by then. The Hill is eternal and unchanging and precisely the opposite all at once. 

But that’s not important for anything other than the fact that the Hill and University both were present by the time Crow had started doing not crow things and working bits of magic _by_ and _to_ make them into crow things. 

Which is to say that there were quite a lot of people from which Crow could learn not crow things, and those people tended to be either a) totally oblivious to anything weird (some of them deliberately so, to be fair), or b) _far_ more conscious of the weird and sufficiently educated on consequences that they gave him no trouble over it. 

(Crow got away with _quite a lot of weird_.)

And so very quickly ( _years_ ), there came to be a crow at the University, who people knew, and who knew people, and he was more than a little magic and more magical than he wasn’t.

  
  


He became more. He became less. _More_ than _just_ a crow, and in so expanding the sum of his parts, _less_ crow overall. It was not easy, save for all the ways in which he did without noticing. It was not particularly good, except for all the joys he found whilst he changed. 

(the becoming, the becoming less and more and more and less- had he _become_ somewhere or -when else, he might have been called a god- a small god, to be sure- but— but that is neither here nor there, nor now nor then.)

Suffice to say: he _became_ . In the becoming found his way under the Hill, and then back over, again and again until Going Underhill was just another crow thing, yet another _magic thing_ , and both at once. 

And then something noticed him. 

The faerie who noticed him might have been of Winter, cruel enough and incensed enough at the lie of his shape to change him into something else. It might have been a summer courtier, beguiled enough by the trick to add even further to it.

Mayhap Spring, ready to encourage growth, even with the death of the previous form. It might have been Fall, doing away with the old to allow for that new growth. Seelie, Unseelie, Sidhe, trooping, wild huntsman, lone fae-

Crow was, at that point, still (mostly) just a crow. He did not know the many courts, the divisions, the factions. But he _became_ , and then his form was _twisted_ to reflect it. 

And so Crow was _not_ a crow, not only. But he was not a faerie either, not truly. 

It was a long time ago. 

_(here is a secret: it’s a queen what makes a court)_

And so, after years (and years and years and years and _years_ ) Crow came to be known as not just a crow, but the thing he’d been made into, a _prince_ among crows, and so: _Crow Prince._ And then: _of the Autumn Court._

Prince. Not really a crow, anymore; not fully (ever) fae. A halfway thing, halfway belonging.

_(and here is another: all anyone wants is somewhere to belong. even fae, even crows.)_

_\----_

In the future, much farther on than when crow became Prince, not terribly much farther than when a girl sung to crows:

_\--_

_“Can’t have a court without a Queen,” he says, and the way he_ looks _at you-_

_You shift, shrug, snap: “I am no such thing.”_

_“Not yet,” says he, snaps back, still_ looking _._

_“You human thing. You mortal, changeable thing,” he says. Half snarls. “If you wanted, you could. Could change. Could_ be _.”_

\----

And in the now, or rather, from where we left off:

\--

You rap the knocker on the door (“quoth the-” no, probably better not to even _think_ that, you know how the crows get about ravens,) and it swings silently open. The four of you duck through, one after another, leaving the spider’s forest behind. 

You step through the doorway to slate-gray stone and narrow windows that will grow larger the closer you move. 

Back in the Crow Prince’s tower, and with your companions this time. Good. Well, better. 

There was a theft, and then a plan, and then, you think, a test, and now you’ve a sword and a shiny and a debt. Not-Jenna still has your sword, the shiny is still nestled in the meat of your shoulder, and the debt is a fuck-off terrifyingly large egg sack from a spider ( _Spider_ ) you’re pretty sure is _still_ debating whether or not it’ll eventually have you for dinner.

Funny how life works out like that. 

But you also have a _name._ Not a Name-name, not anything true, but oh, oh it’s something. 

And in the center of the room you’ve all stumbled into stands the Crow Prince, like he’s been waiting for you, here, this whole time.

“Didn’t grow wings,” you tell him, prompted by the silence. “Did sprout a sword. There might be a summer lady under the impression that I stole it, but fuck her. She threw it at me, it’s mine now. I’m keeping it. Not-Jenna’s holding it for me.”

He blinks, but you think he might be amused. He starts to say something, then stops, shakes his head. 

The Crow Prince holds out his hands, suddenly holding out a plate in one hand and a goblet in the other. You would have sworn he had held nothing before the instant he was indeed holding them: bread and salt _(how?)_ on the plate. Wine, you’re willing to bet, in the goblet.

Hospitality. Bread and salt and wine- he’s offering _hospitality_ . Safety, and good will. A place to _rest_. 

There’s a wry sort of slant to his lips, the angle of his shoulders, something about the way he offers the plate and the cup- these aren’t his traditions, you don’t think, but something he thinks _you’ll_ understand. 

_(Obviously_ the salt isn’t his tradition, you think, but then, well. He got the salt on the plate, didn’t he? He’s not just fae, he’s crow, too.)

You take a piece of bread, press it hard into the salt, eat it. Take the plate, careful, so careful, not to touch his hands (his _talons_ ), pass it to Cat-Eyes. Take the goblet, take a sip, and pass that along too. 

(You can see, from the corner of your eye, Cat-Eyes pressing her own piece of bread into the salt a few times, and Thirteen doing the same. By the time it gets to Not-Jenna, there’s only bread.) (Yes, good.)

There. There, you all ate, you all drank, you should be safe (for now, at least, but that’s enough, you’re all worn down and _tired-_ )

“Rest, I think.” the Crow Prince says, and for how softly he speaks it still startles you, breaks the silence so swiftly. 

He steps forward and takes the plate and cup from Not-Jenna before any of you can even react, then does- something, with his hands, and the plate and cup both are gone. Whisked away into the ether. Gestures, then, to a door behind him, and you follow, the others trailing behind you. 

You maybe shouldn’t just be _letting_ this all happen, but- he offered hospitality, in a way you all understood. Offered, and you accepted, and now- you all need the rest. 

You follow, pass through the door, down a hall, and into another room- a large, low ...it's not quite a bed. A vastly oversized ottoman? In the corner of the room, another door off of the room you're willing to bet leads to a bathroom. Cat-Eyes makes a noise low in her throat at the sight of it, and Thirteen lets out a bone-deep sigh. You can’t help but agree. Next to you, Not-Jenna sways in close, bumping against your shoulder. You’re all going to crash, and _hard,_ the second you get horizontal. 

“One of my birds will fetch you, after you’ve rested,” the Crow Prince says, and you startle again. You aren’t keeping track of him the way you should be, and neither are the others, from the looks of things. 

You turn towards him, nodding, ready to say- something, you’ll figure it out, but he’s already leaving, letting the door swing shut behind him. This feels like a mercy, you think, and maybe the slightest hint of something like debt- but no, hospitality. You can accept this. 

A brief surge of paranoia has you check the door- unlocked - and the last of the adrenaline keeping you up leaves so fast it feels like your legs are made of liquid. Just like in dorm 5, at the beginning of this, you all crawl onto the padded surface and curl up together. You're pretty sure you all sleep like the dead.


End file.
